Monthly Archives: August 2013

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I recently overheard a conversation between strangers about how many cars one woman’s family owned. There is one for each of the kids, one for Mom, one for Dad, and oh yes, the Porsche. Reading the judgmental expression on her friend’s face, this woman quickly followed up to explain, “But that’s just for date night.” Phew, that was a close one! She almost looked like a pretentious “bougie” snob but she totally saved it by explaining that her expensive luxury car is basically just an accessory. “Don’t worry, we don’t go driving that around on a daily basis like rich people, blech! No, no, we barely use ours.” I don’t know about you, but I think that makes it worse. If I drop tens of thousands of dollars on something, I make damn sure I use the crap out of it. A Porsche is an expensive purchase to trot out just for date night. I don’t have so much as a matching pair of underwear for special occasions and you’ve got a dedicated vehicle?

But it’s really not the idea of the spare car that bothers me. I know lots of people with a spare ‘fun’ car that they take out only for joy rides or date nights or what have you. People work hard and can spend their money however they want. Just own it! I hate when people act like they are embarrassed by their wealth. If it is so embarrassing to own a Porsche, why did you buy it? And why did you tell me about it? If this Porsche is your deep, dark, upper-middle class secret, keep it in the garage and only take it out at night with the headlights off. Or, man up and be proud of it! Stand behind your choices! When you say you have a spare Porsche, don’t apologize for it, as you suppress a shit-eating “I’m so happy for me” grin. Just let it spread across your face and with a sigh, acknowledge the elephant in the room, “Yup, guess I’m pretty fucking rich!”

I was unusually pensive as I got ready for work this morning, and I came upon a metaphor between my daily routine and a relay race. In a relay, different team members complete different legs of the race. Fast team members create a lead, but slow team members can quickly waste it away. And I realized this is where I am going wrong; I can’t get to work on time because not all my Team Members are pulling their weight! Get Out of Bed Marisa is the worst, I don’t know who picked her to start. She almost never gives us a lead, hitting snooze every five minutes and making lame excuses like, “I’m not sleeping, I am deciding what to wear today.” But Get Dressed Marisa doesn’t ever seem to get that memo because she wastes more time standing in front of her closet with a blank stare until she gives up and picks out black pants and a black shirt. Don’t even get me started on Take a Shower Marisa. She just stands there like she is shooting a Dove commercial until the hot water runs out. It usually falls to Hair and Makeup Marisa to pick up the slack. Any grand plans she had are abandoned for a quick swish of mascara and a pony tail.

But today was different. You see, Get Out of Bed Marisa ate a lot of salty food yesterday, which meant she drank a lot of water, which meant she really had to pee by 6am. Here it is, the lead we’ve been waiting for. Take a Shower Marisa didn’t even have to complete her leg of the race because after a month of being lazy and making excuses, she finally went to the gym and had showered the night before. Add 25 minutes to the lead. Even Get Dressed Marisa knew what she was doing today, saving more precious time. It all came down to Hair and Makeup Marisa, a pro at throwing something together and running out the door. But since I have the extra time, thought Hair and Makeup Marisa…. And just like that the lead was lost. Time flies when you are trying a new technique with your straight iron for the first time only to realize that your hair still looks bad and have to start from scratch. I just want to know, Hair and Makeup Marisa, was it worth it? You could have used that lead to leave work early today, but instead you spent it on your hair. Tell me, does the wall you face appreciate your new look? Is your computer monitor impressed by your attempt at beach waves? Let me remind you who you work for here. You aren’t on Team Look Good For Strangers, you are on Team The Sooner I Get to Work, The Sooner I Can Leave and Start Enjoying My Me Time. Get it together unless you want to be cut from the team altogether. You are nice to have but we can live without you.

This week’s IOTW comes to us all the way from the West Coast, where my friend Brooke just wrapped up a summer internship. On one of her final days, a full-time colleague at her firm walks up to her and greets her by saying, “So you are the only one of the interns who didn’t get hired on, huh?” This isn’t the most tactfully stated observation. It’s also not a great way to start a conversation. Most people open with a “hi, hello, how are you” before they jump right in to their inappropriate questions. Now, this colleague had no ill intention and did not wish to imply that Brooke was the last kid picked in gym class, or the sad, pathetic, unemployable leftovers. Brooke is a stellar candidate for any job, and had in fact already been offered one in another area of the firm. In IOTW’s mind, he was simply making an observation. “The grass is green. The sky is blue. Everyone got hired, except for you!” And this is the problem with tactless people – they don’t even realize they are doing something wrong. But that doesn’t make it any less offensive. The rules still apply. There are certain things you just can’t go around saying to people.

Photo Credit: fanfarefoodie.wordpress.com

And if I have to follow the rules, so should everybody else! If you have a social or neurological disorder that prevents you from reading situations and applying social sensitivity, I understand that is beyond your control. But otherwise, you don’t get a free pass to be rude just because you are fucking clueless. That’s your fault.

Do you think I like being tactful? Hell no! It is tedious. Do you know how much time I waste thinking of the polite way to phrase things? It’s basically all people do at work. Hmm, what is the polite way of saying, “I just told you that yesterday,” or “The answer to your question is in the email you just replied to. Learn how to fucking read.” How do I explain, “That is in no way my job so I really can’t imagine why you are asking me this.” How do I interrupt this person to say, “My keys are still in the ignition, so please wait until I am at my desk, or at least out of my car, to start asking me these questions.”

And don’t you think I’d like to blurt out my observations? I’d fucking love it! I went to the zoo last week and the most fascinating exhibit I saw was a homo sapien wearing a shredded t-shirt, in the shape of a cross, that showed right through to her bra and enormous gut. I wanted to gawk and ask her what in the world led her to that wardrobe decision. But instead I looked away like I had seen nothing out of the ordinary, as if she were the 100th topless obese woman I had seen that day. Been there, seen that, got the (shredded) t-shirt. Being tactful is everyone’s cross to bear. Sometimes it means bearing the bare skin behind a cross, but usually it means keeping your damn mouth shut!

Like this:

One of the many things I will never understand about people is why they choose to buy clothes that are two sizes too small for them. Well, I do know why. Ye olde Wishful Thinking. You don’t want to be a L, you want to be a S. So you buy the Small, thinking it will make you look small. But it doesn’t. It makes you look like a sausage exploding out of its casing.

Unfortunately, wishful thinking is not effective in these situations. Much like it does not turn Monday into Friday, it will also fail to make you shrink. So I will say that I understand this delusional thought process up until the point when you put on these tiny clothes and look in the mirror. Once you have that proof…how are you still making these poor decisions?

People fervently believe that smaller clothes make you look smaller and bigger clothes make you look bigger. Um….no. I will admit, in the extreme, big clothes can make you look big. If I put on a Muumuu, I might look like a house. But when I wear this certain pair of shorts I have that is two sizes too big because they were on sale and I was determined to get them even if they didn’t fit at all, I don’t look like a house; I look like one of those starving kids on the Feed this Sad, Starving Kid for 10 Cents a Day (If You Don’t, You Have No Soul) commercials. My little twig legs are standing there all lonely-looking inside my cavernous shorts. It’s great. But take those same legs, and stick them into a pair of shorts I still have from high school, and my legs suddenly look like dough exploding out of a Pillsbury can of biscuits.

Photo credit: workingmansdiary.com

I squeeze my legs through them and have a flashback to my days of playing with the Play Doh Fun Factory. How can I look thin one day and fat the next? Because it’s not just about what size your body is, but what size you put on your body. Even a 94-pound model can have a Gus Gus moment if you put small enough clothes on her.

So get over this mental block of refusing to buy a bigger size. Just accept the size you truly are. Not because it is “important to accept yourself” blablabla – but because it will make you look better! Do you really think that somebody is going to be impressed that you can fit into a 0? Not if you “fit” into it like this:

“It fits!”Photo credit: thejunoesque.com

Besides, who is even going to know what size you are wearing? No one. That’s who. Unless of course you forget to take that sticker off the front that repeats your size 12 times like I sometimes do. Or unless you proactively point out topeople what tiny sizes you wear like some pathetic, desperate-for-validation loser. Or unless you have friends who go around pulling the tag out of your pants to read the size. In which case, I think you’ll be able to quickly change the subject from the size of your clothes to, “You fucking creep, get your hands out of my pants!”

But outside of those rare scenarios, no one can see what size you are wearing. Everyone, however, can see your muffin top spilling out over your jeans like an erupting volcano. So think long and hard about what you are really achieving here before you buy that XXS.